


Watchers

by Maia



Series: Gifts [3]
Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Family, Future Fic, Gen, Post-Chosen, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-05-12
Updated: 2007-07-30
Packaged: 2017-10-04 03:04:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maia/pseuds/Maia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What is seen, what is unseen, what is spoken, what is unspoken.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> _Thank you to (Livejournal name) gillo for beta-reading and excellent suggestions!_
> 
> The film which Giles had been made to watch on Xander's birthday is Star Trek III: The Search for Spock; the line "My logic is uncertain where my son is concerned" is spoken by Sarek.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At Giles' house in London, Buffy worries about Dawn; Buffy and Giles talk; Buffy gets an e-mail from Dawn telling her about William; Giles reads his father's journal; Giles gets a phone call and e-mail from Jason Margrave (original character).

**Wednesday, June 11, 2008**

 

"Buffy, do stop pacing."

"She said she would call today. Why doesn't she call?"

"It's only mid-afternoon in New York."

"But she only left two days ago! She's still on British time! She should have called by now!"

Giles wondered how Buffy would have dealt with having a daughter who ran away and did not contact her family for three agonizing months. He doubted that she would have done well in Joyce's place. Or his own. But this was probably not the time to point that out. "You could call her...again."

"I did. Her cell phone is off. Anything could have happened to her!"

"Dawn is a very capable young woman. I find it far more likely that she is expressing her irritation with you than that she is in any kind of trouble."

"Maybe I should call the New York Slayers and – "

"Buffy."

"I know, I know, I'm being over-protective again."

"Quite. Would you like more tea?"

"You really think I need more caffeine?"

"Tea is soothing."

Buffy snorted. "Okay, then."

 

*

 

She started to follow him into the kitchen, then stopped and asked, "What's that?"

Giles followed her gaze to the oddly-shaped rock on his desk. "That was found in Antarctica on the Watchers' Council expedition."

"What is it?"

"We don't know."

Buffy looked alarmed. "That's never good."

"Unknown objects found in Antarctica are far less likely to be dangerous than unknown objects found on Hellmouths."

"Yeah, but still...aren't you guys supposed to give us the heads-up when you find stuff like that?"

"To quote from our charter, only if it is 'relevant'."

Buffy was suddenly in her role as head of the Slayers' Council. "I would like to be informed regardless of whether you believe it to be relevant."

"As you inform us of all your activities?"

"We tell you what we're doing. Mostly."

Giles just looked at her. "As you did in Sydney?"

"That was an anomaly."

Giles raised his eyebrows.

"I know, I know. Trying to control Slayers is like herding cats."

"Really. I cannot imagine what you mean."

Buffy picked up a cushion off the couch and threw it at him.

Giles ducked, and went into the kitchen to make more tea.

 

*

 

Buffy leaned against the kitchen counter. "Giles...do you think I was wrong?"

"About?"

"Dawn."

_Please do not put me in the middle of this._ "I understand both of your points of view."

"And you're not going to budge from Switzerland."

"No."

"I just want to make sure she's okay!"

"She is an adult, Buffy."

"Adults need help sometimes."

Giles winced at the bitterness in her voice.

A line from one of the films that they had all been made to watch on Xander's birthday a few years back flashed through his mind, _'My logic is uncertain where my son is concerned.'_

From childhood he had prized clarity of understanding; from childhood he had been trained to separate truth from illusion; from childhood he had trusted his own observations. Sometimes he had ignored the discerning eye in the back of his mind; sometimes he had outright rebelled against it - but always he had known that he could not cry ignorance; he erred only when he surrendered to his own desires. Always, he had trusted that if he took care to question his biases and put aside his own preferences, his judgments would be accurate.

It had been painful to realize how clouded his judgment had been where Buffy was concerned. There had been horror in the gradual recognition, five years ago this summer, that Dawn's insistence that Buffy needed professional help was correct. And he had failed to see it.

"Giles, the water is boiling."

He came back to himself.

"You were all lost-in-thought-y," Buffy said.

"Yes...Buffy," he began carefully, "I have told you...that I have recognized...that my judgments...where you are concerned...have at times...been...wrong."

"Yeah. We've been through all that. Nobody's perfect."

"Yes. But I do wonder if perhaps your...over-protectiveness...with Dawn does not have something to do with your having been...under-protected."

"Duh!"

Giles felt a stab of irritation.

Buffy sighed. "But knowing why you're doing something doesn't make it easier to stop doing it."

Giles' annoyance disappeared. "No. It certainly doesn't."

"And Dawn's..."

"...as much a daughter as a sister to you. I do understand."

"And rationality goes out the window."

(_'My logic is uncertain where my son is concerned.'_) He nodded.

Giles finished making the tea and they returned to the living room and sat down.

 

*

 

"So do you have a theory on the rock thing-y?" Buffy asked.

"Well...it is rather...unlikely..."

"Why do I have a feeling that it has something to do with your whole tracking-down-all-the-lost-texts- that-are-of-no-interest-to-anyone-except-historians project?"

"Our discovery in Egypt was unprecedented!"

"Yeah, yeah. You went to the previously-undisclosed-locations to get the copies of all the texts the First destroyed so you could create a new library and make   
copies-of-the-copies to seal away in new undisclosed locations and you wound up finding a fragment of a text that no one knew existed that referred to other texts that no one knew existed and ever since then it's been Watcher Fun With Archaeology. And you've spent a ton of time and money and haven't discovered anything that is actually useful."

"Our Allocations Committee doesn't see it that way."

"Your Allocations Committee doesn't live in reality.

"And yours does?"

Buffy laughed. "Okay, _no_ Allocations Committee lives in reality. But anyway – what's up with the rock and the lost texts?"

"One of the re-discovered Sumerian texts refers to an even more ancient record it calls _The Song of the Origin_. It describes it as having been 'woven in stone, broken in fire, hidden in ice,' and – "

"- and you think this thing is it?"

"A part of it. Possibly. Jason believes – "

"Jason Margrave? He's one of your recruits, isn't he? The one who's going to the Columbia Journalism school in the fall, like Dawn?"

"Yes. Very bright young man. He believes that this rock may be a fragment of _The Song of the Origin_."

"But you think that's - 'unlikely'?"

"Well, yes. It seems highly improbable. Jason is still working on translating the Sumerian text. As yet we are working with only fragments of information."

"What's _The Song of the Origin_ supposed to be about?"

"Even that we do not know. Jason is hoping the complete translation of the Sumerian text will tell us. But it may not. It is frustrating, because one of the few texts destroyed by the First which we have not been able to obtain copies of might have cast light on the subject."

"Something that refers to _The Song of the Origin_?"

"Something that _may_ refer to it."

"Huh?"

"You know of the schism in the Watchers' Council during the English Civil War?"

"You've mentioned it."

"During that time, both sides feared that texts would be lost forever, and both sides devised ways to hide copies. One of the texts we have recently discovered is a catalog of those hidden copies. Apparently, copies were given secretly to the Hallows family for safe-keeping, but the record of the transaction was lost during the war. I've found other previously-lost records that indicate that the Hallows family kept the texts and passed them down through the generations, to safeguard them from any future political turmoil."

"Where are they now, then?"

"Arthur Hallows was a close childhood friend of an uncle of mine. As a young man, though, he developed some rather...idiosyncratic...ideas. He believed that killing vampires was evil, and he became a pacifist."

"A PACIFIST about VAMPIRES?"

"Yes. Quite. I do believe his intentions were good. He declared himself a Conscientious Objector and left the Council. He was widely reviled – 'idealistic idiot' was the kindest thing Quentin Travers ever said about him. And his father disowned him. But he stuck to his principles."

"Guess I gotta give him points for guts."

"Yes, he was courageous, though misguided."

"And you think he has the records?"

"I think he may have had them. But he was killed by the First."

"Did he have any kids?"

Giles was surprised by Buffy's interest. But then, she was trying to distract herself from Dawn's failure to call. "That's the odd thing. I kept track of him over the years, and while I know that he was married to an American woman – she died a year ago – I don't recall hearing that they ever had children. But in my attempts to track down the lost texts, I've found records that indicate that Arthur and his wife had a son in 1977."

"So you think the son has the records?"

"Possibly. I'm attempting to locate him. Most of what he would have is redundant. But the catalog does mention one text of which all other copies are lost – and the title of that text is _Key to the Origin_."

"'The Origin' meaning _Song of the Origin_?"

"We're not sure."

"Does any of this have any possibility of being useful?"

"Buffy, it is possible that _The Song of the Origin_ might answer many questions about the origins of demons on earth!"

"And this matters in 2008 why?"

Giles sighed. Buffy would never be interested in knowledge for the sake of knowledge. Very well.

Buffy grinned. "I'm not criticizing, really!"

Her phone rang then.

She dove for it, answered it, and then scowled. "It's another text message." She read the message and said, "It is from Dawn. She says I should check my e-mail."

"You may use my computer if you like."

"Thanks."

Giles took the teacups into the kitchen to wash, to give her privacy.

 

*

 

She was at the computer for a long time. He did not wish to interrupt, so he scrubbed the sink, which did not need it. Then he cleaned out the fridge. Then he scrubbed the stovetop.

"Giles." He looked up. Buffy was leaning against the doorjamb. She was white as a ghost.

"Buffy! What's wrong? Is Dawn alright?"

"She's...fine," she said distantly. "I have to go."

"Are you alright?"

"I – I have to go."

"What has happened? What is it?"

"I have to go. Now."

She turned and headed towards the door.

"Buffy – your handbag."

"Oh. Yeah." She took it without seeing it.

"Buffy. What is wrong?"

"Nothing. I have to go."

"Would you like me to drive you home?"

"No. Thanks. I have to go."

"Buffy! Do you even have a stake?"

"A spike?"

"A stake."

"Yeah. I have a stake. Thanks for the tea. G'night."

"Buffy, please tell me what is going on."

"I have to go." And she left.

Giles wondered if he should go after her and decided against it. Even in a state such as this, she was capable of defending herself. He had seen it before.

But he was shaken. It was rare for Buffy to be so dazed. He wondered what information could possibly have been in Dawn's e-mail that had so stunned her sister.

It was only 9 o'clock in the evening. He made himself some more tea, picked up a book, and tried to read. He couldn't concentrate.

His flat had been painted that spring, and some of his books were still in boxes. Arranging them back on shelves might be a good way to occupy his mind.

At the bottom of a box he found a volume he had not looked at in a long time: his father's unofficial journal of his time as Watcher for a Slayer named Rachel. It had only been for a short time – like so many Slayers, Rachel had been killed less than a year after she was called.

Giles picked up the book and opened it. His father's small precise handwriting filled the pages. He began to read.

_....Rachel walks in a world that I can see but never enter. It is not because I am a part of her world that I can guide her, but because I am outside of it, able to observe it as a whole...._

_....Rachel has come to trust me. It pains me to recognize that she is ignorant of my inevitable betrayal...._

_....Her name means "lamb." Ironic, since that is what a Slayer is, in the end: a sacrificial lamb..._

_Mount Moriah approaches. And I know, to my grief, that the world is Isaac, and Rachel is the ram....._

 

"And rationality goes out the window," Buffy had said. Yes – and no. He loved her as a daughter. But he was sworn to protect the world above all else.

 

*

 

The phone rang. He picked it up. It was Jason. He glanced at the clock. Irritating Americans, calling after 10 p.m.

Jason, though, was oblivious to the time. "Giles – I've translated fourteen more lines – I'm e-mailing you an encrypted attachment. And, Giles..."

Giles listened. Jason's voice seemed to get farther and farther away.

"Giles?"

"Thank you, Jason," he said.

He put down the phone. He went to the computer and logged onto his e-mail. He downloaded the attachment. It took a long time. He read the translation. He read the translation again. He read the translation a third time.

He logged out of his e-mail. He turned the computer off. He took his teacup into the kitchen and washed it.

He got ready for bed.

He went to his bedroom and got into bed. He turned out the light. He stared into the dark.

 

_"We are NOT talking about this."_

_"Yes we bloody well are!"_

_"Tell me to kill my sister."_

_"She's not your sister."_

_"She's more than that. She's me."_

_"I've sworn to protect this sorry world. And sometimes that means saying and doing things that other people can't. They shouldn't have to._

_"You're a killer!"_

 

He wondered who the ram would be this time.

 

 

 

*


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In New York City, Jason (original character) and his brother Sam (original character) talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is from the point of view of an original character, Jason Margrave.

_ **April, 2001** _

_They always looked like UFOs, those evening flights taking off from Newark airport. The weirdly large stars seemed to hover over the horizon, and then they would shrink and disappear as the aircraft turned, vanishing into the ether, leaving the buildings of New Jersey alone, while the planes flew off and away to their legendary destinations._

_Maybe, some of them, to Prague..._

_"Jason, is your homework done?" Mom asked from the doorway. She flicked on the overhead light and the planes and lights of New Jersey were gone._

_"Not yet," Jason said._

_"Well, get to it, then."_

_"Mom..." Jason paused. "Mom - when can I go to Prague?"_

_"Jason. I don't even know if your father is still in Prague."_

_Jason scowled. "Why wouldn't he be?"_

_"Oh, sweetie. I probably shouldn't have told you about any of it. I knew him so briefly..."_

_"Long enough," Jason pointed out._

_"Jason." His mother's voice had a warning note._

_"Can't you tell me **anything** about him?"_

_"Sweetie. There's really not much to tell. I was doing research for my dissertation. Sam was four years old - he was staying with Richard while I went on my research trip. It was my first time behind the Iron Curtain. And I was young. And...when I met your father...it was so brief...and it was 1985 in Prague...and I didn't want to get him in trouble with the authorities...I didn't ask him any questions. He didn't ask me any questions. And then I had to leave. And it would have been hard to keep in touch. We just left it at that."_

_"And wherever he is, he doesn't even know about me."_

_"No. I didn't realize I was pregnant until after I was back in New York."_

_"I want to find him."_

_"When you're older, Jason. We'll find him when you're older. I promise."_

_*_

_ **August, 2001** _

_The New Jersey skyline was shrouded in liquid gold, melding upwards into green, into blue, into purple, into black. Below, the dark cliffs were sprayed with the lights of human invention, and the Hudson river was awash in reflected flame._

_A single sailboat came into view, between the buildings, silhouetted against the honey and cream. Jason swallowed. Mom had loved sailing..._

_He strained to hear Richard's voice through the closed door. He could only catch an occasional word, here and there._

_"Eavesdropping?" Sam asked._

_Jason looked up, shamefaced. "Yeah."_

_"Hey, if it were me, I'd eavesdrop too. But you know - Richard is going to tell you anything that he finds out."_

_"Apparently Mom didn't." He felt a wave of guilt wash over him. He shouldn't be angry with her. Not now. _

_"She would have told you, Jace."_

_"Yeah."_

_"And anyway...whatever happens...Richard has offered to adopt you." Sam had a hopeful look on his face. "He cares about you, he really does. He wouldn't be doing this for you if he didn't..."_

_Jason looked down. Sam was right. Richard had been so nice. He felt almost ashamed for wanting so much to find a father who didn't even know he existed, when Sam's father was ready to take him in, right then and there._

_But then, Richard was Sam's father, not his. Sam had always had a father - yes, a father who had divorced Mom when Sam was only two, but still, a father. Jason had never had one. And now Mom was dead, and he had no parents at all, unless..._

_The door opened. They both jumped; they hadn't heard Richard hanging up the phone._

_Jason's hope died the moment he saw Richard's face. _

_"I'm sorry, Jason," Richard said gently. "But I'm afraid I have bad news. It seems that...it seems that..." Richard took a deep breath. "It seems that Gregor is dead."_

_*_

_ **December, 2001** _

_The sound of the jet engine shattered his sleep. He sat up, his heart pounding. _

_He got out of bed and went to the window. _

_One of the buildings across the river in New Jersey had a warning light for airplanes, a small red light that flashed on-and-off, on-and-off. When he was little one his favorite books had been _The Little Red Lighthouse and the Great Gray Bridge_, and he would think of the little red lighthouse flashing its light, warn-ing, warn-ing, and look at that light across the river, and it was his own guardian, that light, protecting him and all of Manhattan from human error. But what was the point if the danger was not ignorance but malice?_

_Another light appeared over New Jersey. Too far away to hear it, yet. _

_He wondered whether Richard had heard the plane first, or seen it first, from the window of his office, on the 105th floor of the North Tower._

 

*

 

**Wednesday, June 18, 2008**

"Jason, it's after midnight. What are you still doing up?"

"Look who's talking," Jason retorted. He had been so absorbed in what he was doing that he hadn't even heard his brother come home. Sam was standing in his bedroom doorway, his suit rumpled, his blazer over his arm. Still weird, to see happy-go-lucky Sam in a suit. (Though Sam was not as carefree now as he had once been, of course – not as carefree now as he had been before he had lost both his parents within a few months of each other and had to take sole custody of his then-15-year-old brother.) But he wasn't just goofy, funny (overburdened) Sam anymore – now he was an internationally-known peace activist. Very weird. "What time did you get home?"

"Just now. Meeting ran late and I had to finish the grant proposal."

"Yeah, well, I have to finish this translation."

Sam came over and peered at the books and papers spread out on Jason's desk. "Are you still working on that thing for Giles?"

"Yeah."

"Haven't you been working on that for over a month?"

"Yeah."

"Slow going?"

"Yeah."

"Maybe you should give it a rest. You've hardly slept in a week."

Jason sighed. "It's just – Sam, Giles seems really upset about what I'm finding. And he keeps on telling me that he needs the rest of the translations ASAP. But I can't figure out why. I mean – it does talk about the end of the world, but almost all our texts do that."

"You live in a weird world."

"Yeah."

"Want some beer and ice cream?"

Jason laughed. Beer and ice cream was Sam's solution to everything. "Sure," he said. He got up and followed Sam into the kitchen.

 

"I thought this whole thing was just for knowledge of history, anyway," Sam said, over Sam Adams and New York Super Fudge Chunk.

"Yeah. I thought so too. I mean – I'm still trying to figure out if that rock is a fragment of _The Song of the Origin_. But it doesn't really matter if it is or isn't. It would be nice if it were...to go down in Watcher history as the one who found it. But it's just my ego on the line, nothing else."

"So why's it so urgent all of a sudden?"

"This thing's never been translated before. It starts out in Sumerian and talks about _The Song of the Origin_. So we thought it was just for historical interest, cool to research, nothing scary. But then – later on – the language changes - it still uses the cuneiform alphabet, but the language changes – it's actually a demon language, the one they named Achronan A – "

" - the one you're the only living person able to translate - "

"It's only been five years since the First killed everybody – we're, um, still a bit short-staffed. But...yeah. Just me. It's a cool language – all the tenses are weird, though. These demons – they're extinct now – they had a weird sense of time, past and present and future are all mixed up. You can't tell if it's history or prophecy or what. But – the bit I'm translating – talks about seven apocalypses in a row, _'each upon the other as the northern night wanes'_."

Sam thought about that. "Does that mean seven consecutive spring apocalypses, like the ones from '97 to '03?"

"Maybe."

"Maybe it's a different seven spring apocalypses."

"It says that in the last of the seven:   
_'Two souls within a quickened body burn unto flame, burn unto ash.  
Crumbles and falls the gate of hell.'_"

"Spike?"

"Yeah. People lose their human souls when they become vampires, but they gain a demon soul. So we assume that vampires whose human souls have been restored have both – a demon soul and a human soul."

"Interesting."

"Yeah. Anyway, then it starts talking about the Key destroying the universe, and – "

"What's the Key?"

"I dunno. I think Giles does, though. When I told him about those lines, he seemed really upset."

"Did you ask him if he knows what the Key is?"

"Y- yeah. He – was evasive."

"You think he knows and he won't tell you?"

"Guess he doesn't trust me."

"Is that what this is really all about? You're worried Giles doesn't trust you, and so you're working yourself to exhaustion to get this thing translated, to prove yourself to him?"

"I thought he trusted me."

"Jace, he's only known you a year, and he deals with pretty scary stuff. It's not surprising if some of it is on a need-to-know basis."

"Since I'm the only person who can translate this stuff, you'd think he would think I'd need to know!" Jason knew he was being childish.

"Maybe it's not as big a deal as it seems."

"Maybe. Giles wants the translation ASAP, but - he did agree that it seems like there's no immediate danger. But if there's no immediate danger, why does he need it ASAP? I think he knows a lot of stuff that he's not telling me."

"What else does the prophecy-thing say?"

"Lots of stuff that doesn't make sense. _'The Key flows thrice, twice until death and once unto life' – _"

"Huh?"

"My reaction exactly."

"Does it say when it's going to destroy the world?"

"Well, it says there will be 14 more apocalypses between the one that closes the  
Hellmouth and the Key destroying the world."

"For demons who didn't live in linear time, these Achronans - "

" - they didn't call themselves Achronans. That's just the Watchers' Council name for them. They've been extinct for about 30,000 years. They called themselves – I don't know if we're reading it right, but it seems like they called themselves the 'People of the Helix'."

"Well, these 'People of the Helix,' then – for people who didn't live in linear time they sure were specific..."

"Assuming my translation is correct. Which I don't know. And even if it is correct - assuming that we're interpreting the text correctly. A BIG 'if'."

"Yeah."

"But, assuming I'm translating it right, and assuming we're interpreting it right...we've only had 3 apocalypses since 2003..."

"So you've got a while, then. Plenty of time to find this Key, whatever it is, and throw it into Mount Doom or whatever you need to do to keep it from destroying the world."

Jason rolled his eyes. "Sam, will you please, please someday actually READ _The Lord of the Rings_?"

"Well, I _would_ have watched the movies, except a certain geek brother of mine who's a PURIST insisted that the movies shouldn't be watched until the book had been read, so, well..."

Jason grinned. "You know it's my god-given responsibility as your annoying younger brother to make sure you don't commit Tolkien sacrilege."

Sam stuck out his tongue and laughed, and then took another bite of ice cream. "But, seriously, Jace...it sounds like nothing's about to blow right now, so...you really could take time to sleep, you know."

"Yeah. I just – "

"Jace. Take a break. The world isn't going to end tomorrow."

"It might."

"It always might. But it sounds like you've got a bit of time on this. Take a break."

Jason sighed. "You're probably right."

Sam laughed again. "You need to find yourself a girlfriend. Hey, what about that girl you met when you were in London in May? The Slayer's sister?"

"Dawn Summers."

"That's the one."

"I only got to talk to her for about five minutes."

"Yeah, but you said she's going to the Columbia Journalism school in the fall too. You'll be classmates."

"Uh-huh." Jason attended to his ice cream.

"And you seemed pretty taken with her when you told me about her. You said she reads Sumerian, too. You could go 'geeking' together - have romantic evenings translating – cuneiform and candlelight, and –" Sam ducked to avoid the napkin that Jason had thrown at him. He grinned. "Just sayin'. Hey - did you get her phone number, at least?"

"No."

"Jason! I know you're shy, but ya gotta to learn to ASK. Worst thing she can say is no."

"I SAID we only got to talk for a few minutes."

"You also said that Andrew told you that she mentioned you later and said she liked you."

"Andrew thinks 'matchmaker' is his job description," Jason muttered.

"But if she said she liked you..."

"Sam - "

"You need to get some confidence."

"Sam – "

"You need to learn to – "

" - Sam, could we _please_ not talk about this now?"

Sam looked startled. "Yeah. Okay. Sorry."

Jason sipped his beer. "Yankees are playing the Sox tomorrow."

"I better buy more ice cream, then."

Jason grinned. "You're more pessimistic than you look, you know."

Sam laughed. "Touche."

It was late, and they were both tired. They finished their beers and washed the dishes in comfortable silence, and headed to bed.

 

*

 

Alone in his room, Jason looked out the window. The lights of New Jersey spilled out onto the river.

Dawn Summers.

Andrew did say she liked him.

And they would be classmates.

And she did read Sumerian...

 

The wind was from the west. The cool night air was touched with brine as the sea came in to meet the river at high tide.

Across the river the warning light for airplanes came and went, came and went, a soft red heartbeat.

Jason got into bed. The distant sound of traffic on the Henry Hudson Parkway was a gentle lullaby. He fell asleep.

 

 

 

*


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In London, Giles looks through the Watchers' Council personnel records on the Hallows family, and reflects.

**Monday, June 23, 2008**

 

Giles took off his glasses, wiped them, put them back on, and looked again at the photocopy of a "birth certificate" that he held in his hand. _William Whitethorn Hallows. 19 March 1977. Mother Rosemary Pullman Hallows. Father Arthur Nathaniel Hallows._ He wondered if "William Whitethorn Hallows" had chosen the same month and day as the actual birthday of William Whitethorn in 1854. He wondered if it had occurred to the former vampire that he had killed Nikki Wood less than six months after his alleged birth. He wondered if he could even blame William Hallows for Nikki's death, since if a vampire was not the human it had been (and Giles maintained that it was not) then the reverse should be true as well. He wondered what portion of human personhood was restored with the human soul. He wondered if Buffy, sitting in an airplane over the Atlantic, was expecting the Spike she had known. He wondered if she would be disappointed by William Hallows. He wondered if she would like him. He wondered if she would be attracted to him. He wondered if they would fall in love (rather poetic in a maudlin sort of way). He wondered if he himself would like William. He wondered what it would do to his relationship with Buffy if he did not. He wondered how everything had changed so fast.

He had known, of course, that things would change. He had known that the daunting exhilaration of the past few years could not last. He had known that building new institutions from the ashes of the old was a glory not only grim but temporary. He had known that one day the mountain of his magnum opus would become a plateau of bureaucracy and boredom.

But the last few years had brought him great satisfaction, not least because of the business partnership between himself and Buffy. He had had the joy his own father had known when Rupert had joined him on the Watchers' Council. What greater happiness was there for a father than for his adult child to become an equal in the family business? The analogy did not quite hold up, of course...the gulf between Slayers and Watchers was still as wide as the ocean which would separate their headquarters after the Slayers' Council moved to New York City next year. But it was a gulf between equals, now. Buffy was the leader of an army of warriors and he was the leader of an army of researchers. It was a partnership. And he treasured the equilibrium, the easy camaraderie between them. Together they had created something that would last.

He knew, though, that while Buffy had enjoyed their work, it was not as satisfying to her as it was to him. Her calling was to fight, not to build. He had known that sooner or later, she would move on.

Now, Buffy was only occasionally on the front lines. Every Slayer they lost was a tragedy, of course (though an inevitable tragedy), but with every death he was guiltily grateful that it wasn't her. But as younger Slayers grew into leadership roles, the time when Buffy would more often be free to take the more dangerous role she longed for grew ever closer. And he dreaded it. He knew that sooner or later he would lose her again, and he did not know if he could bear it (and he acknowledged, now, that his true motivation for fleeing to England in 2001 was his own inability to endure witnessing her suffering).

The front lines wasn't all that called to Buffy. She still wanted a "normal" life. How she would reconcile the pull of battle and the pull of suburbia, he did not know. He was not sure whether he hoped or feared that William Hallows would help her to achieve both of her seemingly contradictory desires. (And there was a third desire, too. One she never spoke of. But it was there. He saw it in her eyes, the yearning for the heaven she remembered.)

But he knew that however it all played out, the end had begun. Wherever that plane was now, it was carrying Buffy away from him.

He had the sudden strong urge to tear up the "birth certificate" and throw it across the room.

But emotions, of course, were never even that simple. There was curiosity and frustration as well as hope and fear (and anger).

He looked at the "birth certificate" again and sighed. He felt a certain admiration for Rosemary Hallows' thoroughness. Not only was it cleverly faked, copies had been placed in every location where they would be expected, including the Hallows family file in the Watchers' Council personnel records archive, one of the few archives to have escaped destruction by the First.

It was likely, then, that the Hallows texts were indeed in the hands of   
William-the-apparently-not-now-so-Bloody. (Except for it being bloody irritating that he was alive at all...) Not a consummation to be wished.

Giles rubbed his eyes, and thought back.

He had acknowledged to Buffy that Spike had indeed saved the world.   
(Though in the power of the First he could as easily have killed them all...)

He had acknowledged that he had been wrong.   
(Though he could have just as easily been right...)

He had apologized to her for his role in the attempt on Spike's unlife.   
(Though he had made a logical decision, given the incomplete knowledge that he had had at the time...)

Simple to say all that, of course, with Spike dust and Buffy in mourning.   
(Though it hadn't been a lie. He _had_ been proven wrong in that instance. Spike _had_ turned out to be an asset rather than a liability. And even at the time, he had regretted what he had believed he had to do...)

Buffy cherished her memories of Spike, and as it brought her comfort there was no reason to impinge upon them.   
(After Jenny Calendar's murder, Buffy had never once even alluded to Jenny's betrayal...)

When Buffy and Dawn announced that they wanted to learn more about what William had like before he was turned, he'd helped them do the research.   
(And he had been fascinated and somewhat amused by what they had learned...)

But it had bothered him that Buffy never even recognized his point of view. As a demonic entity potentially dangerous to human life, Spike had been well within their jurisdiction.

Now, however...William Whitethorn Hallows was human, and most definitely outside their jurisdiction, as Buffy had so pointedly reminded him before she left for New York .

Never mind that William was unable to account for how he had become human, and it might be in the interests of the Watchers' Council (and the Slayers' Council too, as he had argued to Buffy) to investigate the matter. Buffy had been adamant. And Giles knew that she was right: as an apparently harmless human being (however he had attained that state), William Hallows had a right to privacy.

To compound the frustration, William was Arthur Hallows' legal heir, and so had the right, under both Council law and British law, to keep the Hallows' texts until such time as he believed they should be returned to the Watchers' Council. William apparently had all of Spike's affection for Dawn (and Giles was truly grateful to William for giving Dawn a place to live while she finished her studies). If he discovered what Giles suspected might be in those documents regarding the Key, he would almost certainly refuse to hand them over without consulting both Dawn and Buffy. And as soon as Giles had learned what Jason had found in the Sumerian text (his stomach clenched at the thought), he had decided that it would be highly unwise to tell Buffy and Dawn – or anyone else - until he knew more. (For he did not _know_, yet. He only suspected, and feared...)

Giles rubbed his eyes again. The threat was not immediate. He had time to proceed with caution, gathering more information, telling no one of his suspicions. (And wasn't it a Watcher's fate to know more than he told?) There was too much uncertainty now. And he wished to honor Buffy's request to have time to get to know William, undisturbed. He would bide his time.


End file.
